The Cairo Affair

By: Olen Steinhauer

Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini

Length: 12 hrs and 22 mins

Publisher's summary

Sophie Kohl is living her worst nightmare. Minutes after she confesses to her husband, a mid-level diplomat at the American embassy in Hungary, that she had an affair while they were in Cairo, he is shot in the head and killed.

Stan Bertolli, a Cairo-based CIA agent, has fielded his share of midnight calls. But his heart skips a beat when he hears the voice of the only woman he ever truly loved, calling to ask why her husband has been assassinated.

Omar Halawi has worked in Egyptian intelligence for years, and he knows how to play the game. Foreign agents pass him occasional information, he returns the favor, and everyone's happy. But the murder of a diplomat in Hungary has ripples all the way to Cairo, and Omar must follow the fall-out wherever it leads.

American analyst Jibril Aziz knows more about Stumbler, a covert operation rejected by the CIA, than anyone. So when it appears someone else has obtained a copy of the blueprints, Jibril alone knows the danger it represents.

As these players converge in Cairo in The Cairo Affair, Olen Steinhauer's masterful manipulations slowly unveil a portrait of a marriage, a jigsaw puzzle of loyalty and betrayal, against a dangerous world of political games where allegiances are never clear and outcomes are never guaranteed.

©2014 Third State, Inc. (P)2013 Macmillan Audio

Too many characters

Would you try another book from Olen Steinhauer and/or Edoardo Ballerini?

Narrator was fine. Story lost me and didn't seem to have much plot. Too hard t keep track of the characters. Motives for actions were unclear.

Would you ever listen to anything by Olen Steinhauer again?

Possibly, but with hesitation

Did the narration match the pace of the story?

Narration was fine

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Nothing much. Felt like I had wasted hours

Disjointed

I purchased this audio book with the thought the storyline would be intertwined with intrigue, mystery and romance. What I got was a disjointed band of characters, most of whom were difficult to like, and a storyline difficult to follow with it's constant POV changes and flashbacks. Don't even get me started about the largely irrelevant storyline from '91, which the author somehow felt compelled to tie into the main plot. I really wanted to like this story, as I thought it would be an intelligent listen.

poor plot

After listening to the entire did this book I found that the plot was a bit shallow and was not exciting, with few twists or unexpected moments. It followed a rather haphazard timeline which revealed parts of the story from several different characters viewpoints through jumping back and forth from past to present, to the past again. at the end of the story I came to disdain the main protagonist who had not developed as a character at all during the course of the story But Remained as broken And Shallow As they were At the start.